Pupils hopeless and crying after 'poorly worded' Higher Maths exam

Pupils in Scotland have told the BBC they were left upset, hopeless and fearing for their futures after sitting a Higher Maths exam which they said was "totally unrecognisable" from what they had prepared for in class.

More than 11,000 people have signed a petition calling for a review of the paper, which states it was "poorly worded, inconsistently structured, and out of step with every previous paper".

One of the main complaints the BBC has heard is that some "command words" - the words that indicate how you should answer the question - were different to what pupils had been taught to expect, so they did not know what was being asked.

Newly-created exam body Qualifications Scotland said all papers were checked to make sure they are "clear, fair and suitable".

About 20,000 pupils sat the Higher Maths exam last year.

It is the first year of exams under Qualifications Scotland, which replaced the controversial Scottish Qualifications Authority (SQA) earlier this year.

The SQA was disbanded following criticism from teachers and politicians, in part for how it handled exam grading during the Covid pandemic and in part for its handling of the 2024 Higher history exam paper.

The exam is split into two papers and both have caused problems for pupils - though the petition only complains about paper one.

One S5 pupil in Aberdeen who hopes to study medicine, told the BBC she was worried about her chances of being accepted into university if she does not get a top Maths grade.

She said she felt "well prepared" ahead of the exam - having done four years' worth of past papers - and had got an A in her prelim.

"When I opened it thought it was ok, but I got really upset with it," she said.

"I thought I was really prepared, and had the impression that I was over-prepared but it was so different to what I'd done before."

Heading into the second exam paper after an hour's break, the pupil said she was stressed because of how badly the first paper had gone.

"I scraped a finish in the second paper," she said. "I felt like I was running out of time because I was so stressed. I think it affected my performance."

Another S5 pupil, based in South Lanarkshire, told the BBC the language was "totally unrecognisable" from what he had seen before.

He had hoped to continue his straight-A streak in Higher Maths and go on to study electrical engineering or law but is now worried he might not make the grade.

"I was extremely stressed, it's potentially a future-altering exam," he said. "There were people in tears coming out that paper.

"I felt hopeless going into second paper, it felt like my chances of getting an A were out the window.

"I was expecting the second paper to be easy if they made the first paper hard - it absolutely was not.

"It was as if both papers were constructed in a way that was preventing people from getting top marks."

He called for a review of the paper and wants a formal explanation from Qualifications Scotland.

"You can't do this to people," he said. "It needs to be fair, what was done just wasn't fair."

Ben, a pupil in Perth and Kinross, told the BBC that he expected the paper to be difficult - but took issue with the wording of questions which he said felt "unclear and inconsistent" with previous papers.

"For many students, the problem was not knowing what the question was actually asking or which method was intended, despite understanding the mathematical content itself," he added.

The EIS has asked their maths teachers network about the paper - the initial feedback is that the exam was fair.

Maths teacher Chris Smith is among those who believe this - he told the BBC that Higher Maths needs to be "rigorous" because it is such a valuable qualification.

"There should be questions that are routine," he said. "But there should also be questions which test and stretch the best candidates. This was a good paper that had both."

Qualifications Scotland said it monitors reaction to exams on social media and that quality assurance was in place before and after.

A spokesperson said: "All exam papers are created and checked by experienced subject teachers, including the principal assessors, to make sure they are clear, fair and suitable for learners.

"Papers can vary in difficulty year by year and this is taken into account during our normal marking and grading process so that learners' final grades fairly reflect their achievements and maintain standards."

The Scottish government said the exam diet and question papers were an operational matter for Qualifications Scotland.

Analysis: Will this help win back trust for exams body?

Lucy AdamsScotland education and social affairs correspondent

Exam papers are drafted and re-drafted for about 12 months before pupils sit down with the final paper.

And within about a week of an exam being sat, staff at Qualifications Scotland, should start getting an idea of how the paper has been received.

If there were a question or series of questions which the majority of pupils have struggled to answer correctly, that question (or the results from it) may be dropped from the paper. Or the overall pass mark could be dropped.

Normally this would be addressed only at the awarding stage - when the staff and examiners look at what the pass boundaries are for grades A to C.

Back in 2015 there was uproar about the Higher Maths. Paper and the pass threshold for a C had to be dropped to 34%.

The final straw was the 2020 fiasco when exams were cancelled and teachers estimated results for students.

But then thousands of pupils had their grades lowered by the SQA.

Qualifications Scotland was only created earlier this year and as such faces more scrutiny than ever before.

Especially as the stated aim of the new body was to "win back trust".

So, a petition calling for a review of one its highest uptake subjects is at best difficult timing for the new body.